your mental state is the average of the five things you think about the most.

your creativity is the average of the five works of art you spend the most time trying to read or watch or understand.

your ability to be loved is the average of the five things you most do that are lovable.

Corollary: Stand next to the smartest person in the room.

Persistence + Love = Abundance

Everything in life is pretty difficult. Being born is difficult. And it starts there.

When I wanted to write and public a book, I wrote four unpublishable novels, I wrote 40–50 short stories. I pitched and shot pilots for two different TV shows. I did years of research and work on the topic that eventually became my first published book.

Now 18 books later I’m debating working on the 19th.

The same is true for business, for love, for health.

The 1% Rule

If something compounds at 1% a day, it will be 37 times better in a year.

If something loses 1% a day, it will be 0.03% of what it was in a year.

If I want to get better at golf, I should try to get 1% better every day. Then, in a year, I will be 37 times better.

If I want to get better at being a loving person, try to be 1% more kind each day.

I know it’s hard to quantify. It’s impossible. But the direction is what is important. It will all shake out in the end.

This is the path to improvement in any area of life.

The ‘What I Liked As a Kid’ rule

List the things you liked when you were six, eight, 10, 14.

I liked writing, science fiction, games, James Bond, The Force, etc.

List at least ten things.

Now list what you can do with those things as an adult. How did these loves age with you?

If you do this every day, eventually you will find what you want to do as an adult.

Is it every too late? It’s never too late. I’m 49 and I do some form of this exercise every day.

Plus, Minus, Equal

To learn anything. You have to find a:

PLUS: a real or virtual mentor who can teach you.

EQUALS: people who can challenge you

MINUS: people you can teach, because teaching solidifies learning.

Everyone is Irrational All of the Time

Borrowing this from Scott Adams. Thanks Scott!

He told me, “once I realized that everyone is irrational all of the time my life became a lot simpler.”

People are programmed by their upbringing, their genetics, their educations, the desires of the people around them, their cognitive biases that date back millions of years.

There’s no way to fight through that jungle of bias to come up with rational behavior.

What this means: it’s no use assuming people will be rational towards us. It’s no use fighting for strong opinions. It’s no use telling people what to do or using rational arguments to get people to do what you would like them to do, even if it’s to treat you nicer.

This is the argument for living by example. Even in life: Show and don’t tell.

The 64/4 Rule

If 20% of the effort creates 80% of the value (think of a job: 20% of the employees do 80% of the work), then square that.

So now 20% of the 20% of the effort makes 80% of 80% of the value.

So 4% of the work you do in life creates 64% of the benefits in your life.

Find that 4%, be ok with only creating 64% of the benefits, and then use the other 96% each day to focus on things that you love.

I do this. I have not maximized, for instance, the money I could make in life. But every day I do my top five things (see the 5/25 rule) and I gave away about 96% of my possessions because only the 4% were providing most of the value in my life.

And now I have time to be creative every day, to be with people I love, to not worry about my material possessions, to spend time exploring this wonderful world we live in.

The Self-Esteem Rule

It’s really hard to have self-esteem. Everyone wants to take it from us. A boss, a teacher, a parent, a friend, a lover.

But it’s hard to hold onto your own self-esteem, let alone have two.

Never let someone else take care of your self-esteem. Even the partner you love the most.

They can’t handle it. They have to deal with their own self-esteem. That’s a full time job.

Positive Action > Feeling Gratitude

But even better, when I am feeling down, I think of three positive things I can do today that will make my life move forward. And then I do them.

Every time I feel stressed or anxious, this is usually because I am worried irrationally (because all people are irrational) about something invisible happening in the future.

Gratitude will band-aid those feelings. But taking positive actions, however small, will actually give me greater confidence that the future will be better than I imagined.

Well Being = Good relationships + Improving Competence, + Freedom

At the end of the day can you check the box on those three things? Did I improve my relationships? Did I improve my competence at some area I love. Did I do something to increase my feeling of freedom?

If so, then this is the best indicator of future well-being.

Happiness is fleeting and often beyond our control. We’re happy when we hit a goal. And then it disappears.

But well-being is something we build up. A giant well we fill that we can draw on for the rest of our lives.

The Hell Yeah Rule

Thanks to Derek Sivers for always letting me take TOTAL credit for his ingenious rule.

“If it’s not a HELL, YEAH, it’s a NO!”

This is the way to say NO almost all of the time.

This can also be called the “Life is too short” rule.

And finally,

Surrender

A good poker player plays the hand he or she is dealt. Never complains and says, “I wish I was dealt an ace”.

I can’t control my kids. My partners, My friends. The weather. Popular opinion.

I can only do the best I can right now and then surrender the results. Once you release the bowling ball, your job is done.

Once I give you a kiss to wake you up, the feeling you have when you open your eyes and look at me, is totally up to you.